Pete Flynn, Mets Groundskeeper for Almost 50 Years, Dies at 79

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Pete Flynn, then the Mets’ head groundskeeper, preparing the pitching mound at Shea Stadium before a team workout in 1981.CreditSara Krulwich/The New York Times

By Daniel E. Slotnik

June 22, 2017

Pete Flynn was a New York Met longer than Ed Kranepool, Keith Hernandez and Bud Harrelson combined. He stayed with the team as it went from National League punch line to World Series champion, and as it moved from the Polo Grounds to Shea Stadium and then to Citi Field.

Mr. Flynn, who was a Mets groundskeeper for almost 50 years, died on Wednesday on the way to a hospital in Middletown, Conn. He was 79.

His daughter Eileen Flynn said he had been in poor health since an operation for skin cancer in March.

Having been with the team since its inception, in 1962, Mr. Flynn was named head groundskeeper in 1974, a post he held until 2001, overseeing a crew that now has more than 15 members. Rather than retire, though, he rejoined the crew.

Mr. Flynn did more than maintain a fairway-trim field in the middle of Queens; he also welcomed visiting dignitaries and celebrities. After the Beatles played their historic Shea Stadium show in 1965, he drove John, Paul, George and Ringo from center stage to the center-field fence, where an armored car waited to help them escape nearly 56,000 screaming fans.

Forty-three years later he drove Paul McCartney to the stage in a golf cart when Mr. McCartney made a surprise appearance at a Billy Joel show, the last concert held at the stadium. Mr. Flynn was also on hand in 1979 when Pope John Paul II rode onto the field, and he recalled that rainy skies lifted when the pontiff arrived.

Keeping the grounds pristine at the Mets’ three home fields since 1962 was no easy feat.

Shea Stadium was also home to the New York Jets for most of their first two decades, so Mr. Flynn had to deal with the seasonal damage wreaked by professional football players. He weathered a four-team assault on his turf when the Yankees and the National Football League’s Giants joined the Jets and the Mets as Shea Stadium tenants in the mid-1970s. (Giants Stadium in New Jersey was being built, and Yankee Stadium was being renovated.)

The Kentucky blue grass in the outfield had to be kept at a uniform length, the clay around home plate and on the pitcher’s mound had to be mirror-smooth, and the infield dirt, a combination of sand, clay and silt, was more carefully maintained than a Zen garden’s sand.

The field had to be protected from rain, wind and, occasionally, overzealous fans. After the Mets clinched the National League East title in 1986 on their way to their second World Series championship, fans rushed the field and ripped up the sod as souvenirs.

“The whole field looks like it’s been bombed,” Mr. Flynn told The New York Times after the game. He persevered. “It won’t be 100 percent,” he added, “but we’ll put it back together, and we’ll have the game tomorrow.”

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Mr. Flynn after tossing a ceremonial pitch at Citi Field before the Mets’ final game of the 2011 season.CreditKathy Kmonicek/Associated Press

Mr. Flynn and his crew worked through the night, and the next day’s game, against the Chicago Cubs, went off without a hitch.

Peter George Flynn was born on Feb. 12, 1938, in County Leitrim, Ireland. His parents, Peter Flynn and the former Mary Kate McGovern, had a farm.

Mr. Flynn immigrated to Canada in 1960 and to New York City the next year. He got a job as a handyman for the Mets and moved to groundskeeping after he told them that he had landscaping experience. His daughter said that he had known nothing about baseball before working for the team, but that he grew to love the game.

He married Anne McCarthy in 1968. She died in 2003.

In addition to his daughter Eileen, he is survived by another daughter, MaryAnne Poeschl, with whom he lived in Clinton, Conn.; two sisters, Kathleen Moran and Peggy Boyle; and five grandchildren.

In 2012, Mr. Flynn received the Mets Hall of Fame Achievement Award. He was honored on the field in an emotional ceremony alongside Tom Seaver, Mike Piazza, Yogi Berra, Willie Mays and other former players and managers before Shea Stadium closed in 2008.

So he did not. He kept working as a groundskeeper at the Mets’ new home, Citi Field, until 2011.

Correction:

An obituary on Friday about Pete Flynn, the New York Mets’ longtime groundskeeper, misspelled, in some editions, the given names of his daughters and misstated which of them he lived with in Clinton, Conn. They are Eileen Flynn, not Aileen, and MaryAnne Poeschl, not Mary Anne; and he lived with Ms. Poeschl, not with Ms. Flynn.

Susan C. Beachy contributed research.

A version of this article appears in print on , on Page B15 of the New York edition with the headline: Pete Flynn, 79; Kept Mets’ 3 Fields Trim. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe